Details on iBooks Textbook Pricing and Distribution

By Jim Tanous

Jan 19th, 2012 2:12 PM EST

Apple’s new textbookecosystem will follow the same model as the App Store and iBookstore, with the company taking 30% of each individual sale, according to Engadget. It also appears that the introductory US$14.99 price per textbook is a hard ceiling set by Apple, with publishers free to offer their works at any price at or below that mark.

In addition, textbooks that are made available on the iBookstore must be exclusive to Apple’s products and cannot be sold on any competing platform. This coincides with the iBooks Author licensing terms that prohibit content created with the app from being sold anywhere other than through the iBookstore. Content creators can, however, distribute their works for free via the web.